I'll Be Waiting
by Konoha's White Fang
Summary: AU IchiRuki, Love me without fear. Trust me without questioning. Need me without demanding. Want me without restrictions. Accept me without change. Desire me without inhibitions.


**I'll Be Waiting**

**-**

**Thanks a lot to my beta-reader Kyoko Kasshu Minamino!**

* * *

It was the same every Thursday night; she would be working until the shop was closed. Kuchiki Rukia worked in a little café shop in order to get money for her last year college. Her brother told her that it was time for her to start earning money on her own to learn how to support herself in the future. Although she came from a rich family, she had to work in that café as a waitress.

She sighed heavily as she went to a table near the window: the last table and then she would take a little rest for a while until some customer decided to interrupt her little time for herself. A young couple was sitting across from each other holding hands and talking to each other. She served them what they had ordered and went back to drying the cups and glasses with the towel.

Upon noticing the young couple asking for the bill, she quickly went to hand them their requested piece of paper. She was eager to rest her feet a little: she was having a tough day after all. The shop was busy and she didn't get the chance to sit for a second so she ended up standing the whole time.

They paid for their meal and went out of the shop still holding hands. Rukia took the money back to the cashier and noticed that they had given her a generous tip. Feeling a little sleepy, she decided to make herself some coffee. While the coffee was being made, she leaned over the clerk's table, her hand supporting her face as she fell into deep thoughts.

Why didn't she have someone to hold her hand like that? Of course she had her friend Renji but he was only her best friend. She met him when she was a little girl and grew up with him as he happened to be her next house neighbor. They used to play together a lot but after growing up, each of them went on their own separate way. She was supposed to take on her brother's company and he chose to be a lawyer, that's why they didn't get to be in the same classes.

She sighed as she heard the owner of the shop calling her. "Kuchiki, quit slacking off!" He warned her.

"I am not!" Rukia yelled back. "No one is here!" She was getting irritated by her annoying pain-in-the-ass boss. He always kept on teasing her and annoying her, accusing her that she was slacking off which she wasn't in the least and blaming her for every mistake that happened in the shop even if it was not her fault. Most of all, she hated him because he made her wear that tight and short outfit, saying that, that was the official uniform in the shop which wasn't but she couldn't do anything if she wanted to keep her job for _now_ and not get fired.

She heard a beeping noise which she recognized as the coffee machine indicating that the coffee was ready. She stretched her arms and muttered some curses about her outfit rising to reveal a fair amount of her white skin and made her way to grab a clean cup. She poured the coffee in the cup and went to sit at one of the tables. She looked down at her watch and noted that it was 11 pm. It made her feel happy to think that there wasn't a lot of time left until the shop was closed.

She sipped her coffee slowly, savoring every taste of it while closing her eyes in pleasure as she slipped her high heel shoes off. Finally she could feel some rest and peace. She averted her sight to look outside of the window's shop; it was pouring outside. The rain was like a sheet that kept swaying by the force of the wind.

She made herself more comfortable in the chair and placed both of her hands around the cup to take in its warmth. She stared into her coffee with her damp violet eyes that were once so vivid. She was alone sitting in that shop drinking coffee on that rainy night instead of being at home with someone who cared about her.

Sad to say, but she had no one at the moment, after her brother's little lecture about starting to depend on herself; she took it upon herself to move into her own apartment as fast as she could and so she did. She lived alone with no one. Don't get her wrong, she had friends but they were all into their lives. Inoue and Ishida were dating and she would never bother them after finally getting them together while Renji was currently out of town.

The bell hanging above the shop's door rang softly, signaling the arrival of a new customer to her annoyance. She didn't get to take a decent rest; she quickly slipped her shoes on before making her way back to the kitchen to clean her cup of coffee. Upon finishing that, she walked out and glanced around the shop until her eyes rested on a familiar mop of hair. She grumbled as she slowly made her way to the occupied table, not too eager to meet _that_ exact guest.

She put on a fake smile as she neared the table. It was the same table he would always sit at: the table in the dark corner near the window and she guessed the reason. She assumed because he didn't want to catch attention because of his wild hair's color.

_Orange...Can you believe it?_

"What would you like today, Kurosaki-san?" She asked impatiently, oh she knew him alright and to tell you the least, she really found him an annoying arrogant thick-headed moron. Lately she started suspecting that he liked to come to that shop only to tease her.

"I told you not to call me like that, midget," he smirked knowing fully-well that by that simple remark, he would be able to provoke her. The first time his eyes lay upon her he liked her and he couldn't figure out why. Her violet eyes captured his attention to the point that he couldn't take his gaze away from her but for some odd reason, he didn't know why he _loved _to tease her.

A vein popped out of Rukia's forehead when she heard him dare to make fun of her height. "What did you say, moron?!" She hissed while shooting him a death glare. He kept on calling her that although she tried to be nice to him.

"Call me Ichigo, midget," he said through gritted teeth and shooting her a similar glare. "You know that I hate formalities so--OW!" However, he didn't get to finish his sentence as he was hit in the shin by a fuming Rukia.

"Why did you hit me?!" He asked her while rubbing the sore spot where she hit him.

"What do you want, Ichigo?" The raven-haired waitress asked impatiently, ignoring the glare that she was being shot because of her previous act of power.

"Plain coffee would do," he answered her while looking away from her and into the window.

However, once she left to get his order, he took a peek at her retreating form. She looked like an angel. She had silky raven hair although he didn't touch it but he was sure about that, and perfect lips who looked so soft and delicious yet he still didn't get the chance to have his lips meet hers.

Her hips were swaying as she walked with her high heels shoes which made her a lot more sexy. He had no doubt in mind that she was the most beautiful and angelic thing he had ever seen. That's why; he would always come to that shop after finishing his work only to look at her and to tease her of course.

Rukia sighed as she started making new coffee for the unwelcomed guest in her opinion. He always got on her nerves; it was just like he knew how to push her buttons, like it was some sort of a game to him. She heard her boss talking to her so she turned her face to look at him.

"You know, Rukia, I could tell that, that man over there has taken into liking you," he spoke while holding a towel and cleaning the clerk's table with it.

"_What?_" She tried to keep her voice low but she was too shocked to hear him say that to the point that she couldn't keep herself from snapping her head to look at him. Ok, she had her suspicious about that but she would quickly shrug them off as soon as he would start teasing her about her height.

"What do you mean by that? He always calls me a midget!" She hissed, already annoyed by the fact that she had to tell her boss about the nickname she hated the most.

"He does that because he likes you, that's how men express their feelings: they are just bad at doing this kind of stuff." He chuckled lightly but tried not to make much of a fuss about her nickname. When he didn't hear her response about what he said, he caught her looking at the young orange-haired man so he decided not to annoy her and left her alone.

Rukia thought about what her boss had told her and she couldn't help but glance at the young customer. She caught him taking off his jacket and placing it on the back of his seat. He was wearing a black shirt underneath the black jacket that he had just taken off with black pants. Ok...so she would admit that he was an attractive and handsome young man but the moment he dared to open his mouth, everything about his looks disappeared from her mind.

She closed her eyes and rubbed her temple, feeling a headache building in. Once she heard the familiar beeping, she quickly took out a cup and poured the hot coffee into it then went to serve it to the waiting man.

"Here you go," she said tiredly. When she was about to turn back she heard him thanking her but what made her stop in her tracks was that stupid nickname of his. "What the hell is wrong with you?! Stop calling me that, Strawberry!" Her face was flushed with anger as she tried to calm herself down as much as she could.

He smirked but kept quiet nonetheless and sipped his coffee slowly while closing his eyes to avoid looking at her retreating form. Although he was smirking from the outside, in the side he longed for her to accept him and maybe to feel the same way about him. He was expressing how much he liked her by constantly teasing her—which always earned him an opportunity to talk with her and to hear her soft yet icy voice.

He would admit that he was slowly falling for her to anyone but not to her because he was too much of a coward to do so and to actually ask her out. He was afraid of her rejecting him which could make the air around them when they _talked_ feel awkward and he most certainly didn't want that to happen.

He sighed and kept on sipping his coffee slowly to stay there as much as possible without drawing suspicious. Though, he could tell that the man she was talking to just now, knew something about his intentions.

He looked down at his cup and found that he had finished it so he paid for it at the clerk but didn't leave; instead he went to the bathroom at the back of the shop. Ichigo looked at his reflection in the mirror and scowled then splashed some water into his face before drying it with a towel.

On his way out of the bathroom, he spotted her walking in his way so he took his chance and went to speak with her. "Hey there, umm...I-I want to tell you something, Rukia..." He struggled to find the right words without angering her or insulting her.

"What is it?" She waited for him to continue but he just kept quiet, rubbing the back of his neck nervously while looking at the floor. "Spit it out," she demanded impatiently. She didn't have time for that now.

"I don't know how to tell you this so...if you would let me...show you, would be better," he told her, finally having the courage to look at her in the eyes. Don't get him wrong, he wasn't a coward but when it came down to women, he couldn't find the courage to express himself.

"Sure," she hesitated a bit before answering him. Eying him suspiciously waiting for him to do anything wrong that would have her hit him.

Ichigo took a deep breath before in a graceful motion pulled her closer to him and locked his lips with hers. They felt soft and they tasted nice, he ran his hand through her hair and it felt silky under his touch just like he had imagined.

Rukia was taken aback by him suddenly kissing her, she wanted to push him away and hit him for doing something as pervert as that but the problem was that she couldn't bring herself to do so. She would admit that she loved the feeling of his lips against hers, they felt so right. She felt his hand sneak up into her hair and to the back of her head, pushing her closer to deepen the kiss and surprisingly she didn't protest at all.

She in turn had one of her hands in his messy orange hair, holding on to his wild locks while the other was behind his neck. She felt his hand drawing circles on her back then felt herself being pushed back into a wall. When she hit the wall, she felt his tongue play at her lips as if he was asking for an entrance and she obeyed.

With her parting her lips a little, the passionate kiss turned into a dance as their tongues met each other and danced gently at the rhythm of their racing heart beats. She felt her knees buckling under her and if it wasn't for him holding her pinned against the wall like that, she was sure that she would've been on the floor by the now.

She felt his soft hands hovering around the hem of her shirt but they didn't dare to go that far by touching her. With that she knew that he was a true gentleman and not some kind of a pervert, because she knew that most men would've had their hands up in her shirt by now but he didn't even dare to touch even the front of her shirt. Maybe he did like her and was afraid to do something wrong which meant that he cared about her.

Finally after the breath taking kiss, they broke apart each gasping for air. He looked up at her to find her face flushed red but then quickly averted his sight to look at the floor underneath him with a faint blush across his cheeks.

"I'm really sorry, you probably want to beat the living day out of me," he mumbled waiting for her to say something, _anything _to ease the awkwardness that hung around them in the air.

"Wow." Was all that she could say for now but as she thought more about it, he needed a better answer than that so she looked at him and smiled gently at him then kissed his cheek as if answering him. He snapped his head at her and stared at her vivid violet eyes while grinning at her. However her smile faded as she reached out and slapped the back of his head. "Don't you dare try to do that again, moron! I thought that you were a pervert!" She scolded him.

"You didn't have to hit me--OW! STOP THAT!" He complained in pain as she kept on slapping the back of his head and sometimes kicking him in his shin. They kept on fighting like that until her boss called out for her.

"So when will you finish your work? It's already past twelve," he wondered as he looked at his watch and then back at her.

"I just have to close the shop and then I can leave," she replied with her usual careless demeanor. He nodded at her and told her that he would wait until she finished her work. Before she could go back to work, she heard him saying that he wanted another cup of coffee but thay time with sugar. She raised an eyebrow at his smirking face but then shrugged it off and went to bring him his coffee.

Ichigo took his seat back where he left his jacket and waited for her to come back with his coffee. He rested his face in the palm of his hand and watched her as she gracefully made the hot black liquid then served it to him and went back to cleaning the shop to finally close it.

He watched her every move as she cleaned the tables and tidied the shop. She was breathtaking and he wondered how she was still single. The shop's dim light made her features all the more fascinating and every time she glanced at him, he was left dazed by her violet eyes; they were extraordinary and seemed to have the power to knock the breath out of him.

Finally, she finished everything and was ready to close the shop; he stood up and donned his jacket again then waited for her to come.

"Let me give you a ride home," he told her while giving her one of his rare smiles. He noticed a faint color of red on her cheeks but it quickly disappeared as she looked up at him.

"No, thanks. I'll walk home," she replied as she started making her way out of the shop but before she could leave he held her by her arm and whirled her around to be facing him.

"It's pouring outside, you can't walk," he whispered in her ear, making the hairs on the back of her neck stand and her breath become heavier. He was too close to the point that she could feel his breath tickling her skin.

She couldn't say anything so she only nodded in acceptance and before he could leave her, he gave himself the permission to kiss her flushed cheek. "Alright then let's go to my car," he chirped happily at the reaction he got just because he held her that close.

Rukia had her eyes wide open. Did he just do that? He dared to steal a kiss away from her, maybe she thought of him wrong, maybe he was a pervert after all so she allowed herself to slap him across the back of his head earning herself a glare with lots of curses under his breath.

Ichigo took out his keys and was about to open the car's door when he noticed that Rukia was shivering from the cold, it was only convenient with that outfit she's wearing. Why was she wearing it anyway? He made a mental note to ask her about that later as he reached for his jacket and took it off, giving it to her with his usual scowl plastered on his face. "Here," he told her without looking at her.

She stared at the black jacket then back at him. "No thanks, I don't need your jacket," she refused with her all too mighty tone, the moment she said that, a shiver ran through her which proved otherwise. He looked at her then smirked at her shivering form. "Well, you don't look like you don't need it," he mocked her and that earned him another glare.

"Take it, you're shivering," he ordered her but she still didn't take the offered jacket, he sighed and then decided that he would make her take it, he didn't need her to get all sick on him. So he walked to stand behind her, jacket in hand while gently holding her hand to make it wear the jacket. She tried to struggle in his hold but he was too strong and stubborn to let her go. So she decided to try and kick him and that only made her stumble on her feet and end up leaning on his chest for support.

He looked down at her, a blush staining his cheeks and stuttered to get the words out of his mouth. "Well...we should get going. I think that you are fully capable of wearing it on your own." Once she moved away from him, he quickly missed the warmth of her form leaning against his chest. When she was too close to him, he was able to smell the lovely scent of her hair, it had the smell of lavender and it matched her quite well.

She nodded hesitantly and wore the black jacket; it looked baggy on her, extremely baggy. She looked up at him and saw him grinning at her.

"It suits you well." He tried to muffle a chuckle from seeing her wearing his jacket, it looked funny on her petite form.

She glared at him then made her way to open the door of the passenger's seat next to him. His car was also black she noted and she found that the color suited him well, plain and simple. It was a Porsche so she assumed that he was wealthy just like her.

She sat on the leathery seat, hugging the jacket tightly, feeling warmth enveloping her. She inhaled his masculine scent that stuck to the offered jacket and closed her eyes. He smelled nice, almost like cinnamon, which she liked a lot.

She heard the engine of the luxurious car start so she opened her eyes and looked at him as he asked her about the location of her house. She hesitated a bit before answering him. "Near the Kurosaki clinic," she told him. He looked at her with wide eyes.

"No kidding!" He was surprised to say the least, her house was near his family's house, but what made him more surprised that he had never seen her before in the neighborhood.

"Why? What's wrong with that?" She asked slightly annoyed by his reaction. As he kept quiet for a little too long, she started shifting in her seat uncomfortably.

"Well...that's my dad's clinic, I used to live there," he answered her, concentrating fully on the road before him to avoid an accident.

"Oh, so that means that you live and work there, right?" She eyed him curiously, staring at him intensely. The moon's light reflecting the side of his face in the dark night making her heart pound because he looked handsome and peaceful even with that scowl of his.

"Actually no, I'm not a doctor and I don't live there anymore. As a matter of a fact I'm a businessman and I work at the Kuchiki Company," he told her as he turned to glance at her with the corner of his eye, he noticed that she was shocked to hear that and he wondered why.

"At the Kuchiki Company?!" She echoed his words just to make sure that she heard him right and when he answered her with a yes, she was surprised to say the least. How was her brother capable of tolerating Ichigo's rudeness and impolite behavior? Knowing Byakuya, he would have fired him the first minute he laid eyes on him, but he still worked in her brother's company; which meant that he was skilled and trustworthy to stay in that job at her brother's company. And that made her admire him even more.

"I would assume that your boss is, Kuchiki Byakuya, am I right?" She stated more than asked and saw his amazed expression as he allowed himself to look at her when they stopped at a red light.

"How did you know?" He wondered.

"He's my brother." She sighed and closed her eyes while massaging her temple, waiting for his outburst at knowing that but it never came as he only made an acknowledgment sound to show her that he heard her.

"I should've know when I first knew that your name is Kuchiki Rukia," he added more to himself than to her and continued driving.

Finally as he couldn't take it any longer, he decided to ask the question that had been bugging him since he saw her. "Um...why do you wear this tight outfit?" He asked her in a low voice to avoid any embarrassment.

"It's my _uniform_, moron," she replied, annoyed by his question about her _outfit._

"I know, midget. I'm asking: why is it so tight?" He tried to stay calm but her calling him a moron every time started to get on his nerves.

"Well...my boss said that this is the usual outfit and I know that he's lying so don't bother," she explained then turned her gaze to look outside of the window. She watched with mild interest as they passed other cars while rain was hitting the window's glass like a hammer pounding on it.

She noticed that they started to slow down a bit so she looked back at Ichigo and heard him telling her that they were at her house. She opened her door slowly as rain started pouring down on her, soaking her hair and face. Walking up the steps of her house to reach the door, she felt a warm hand holding her by her wrist so she turned around and saw the man whom gave her a drive, soaked to the bone with his usual wild hair down, it looked strange on him but to tell you the truth, she found him quite sexy when he was wet.

She blushed as she looked at the hand holding hers then before she knew it, she felt herself being pulled into an embrace. It felt good to be in another person's arms, warmth filled her senses as she felt him planting kisses down her neck. Then felt his breath tickle her ear as he spoke: "It's been nice knowing you, Rukia, and I really would like to know more about you, tomorrow maybe?" He whispered into her ear, sending chills down her spine.

"Sure," she answered him softly. And before she could react, she felt soft lips on her own as he kissed her yet again. When they broke apart, he smiled at her gently with caring eyes then turned his back to her to go back to his car. "Goodnight, Rukia!" He waved his hand from behind before he got into the car and left.

Rukia stood in her place, still shocked from everything that happened. Upon sobering from her shock state, she felt her blood boil when she realized that he had stolen yet another kiss from her. Inwardly, Rukia smiled and wished him a good night too. Looking back at the road for one last time before entering her house, she thought with a smile on her face. _"And I'll be waiting." _With that she hurried inside to get herself dried before she caught a cold.

-

**Fin**

**

* * *

**

A/N: First of all, I don't own Bleach and never will, I hope that you have enjoyed this little IchiRuki one-shot fic.

**Reviews are appreciated!**

**Thx for reading!**

**~KWF~**


End file.
